Performance and combustion characteristics of a DI diesel engine fueled with waste palm oil and canola oil methyl esters

This study discusses the performance and combustion characteristics of a direct injection (DI) diesel engine fueled with biodiesels such as waste (frying) palm oil methyl ester (WPOME) and canola oil methyl ester (COME). In order to determine the performance and combustion characteristics, the experiments were conducted at the constant engine speed mode (1500 rpm) under the full load condition of the engine. The results indicated that when the test engine was fueled with WPOME or COME, the engine performance slightly weakened; the combustion characteristics slightly changed when compared to petroleum based diesel fuel (PBDF). The biodiesels caused reductions in carbon monoxide (CO), unburned hydrocarbon (HC) emissions and smoke opacity, but they caused to increases in nitrogen oxides (NO_x) emissions.     

Emission characteristics using methyl soyate–ethanol–diesel fuel blends on a diesel engine

A blend of 20% (v/v) ethanol/methyl soyate was prepared and added to diesel fuel as an oxygenated additive at volume percent levels of 15 and 20% (denoted as BE15 and BE20). We also prepared a blend containing 20% methyl soyate in diesel fuel (denoted as B20). The fuel blends that did not have any other additive were stable for up to 3 months. Engine performance and emission characteristics of the three different fuels in a diesel engine were investigated and compared with the base diesel fuel. Observations showed that particulate matter (PM) emission decreased with increasing oxygenate content in the fuels but nitrogen oxides (NO_x) emissions increased. The diesel engine fueled by BE20 emitted significantly less PM and a lower Bosch smoke number but the highest NO_x among the fuel blends tested. All the oxygenate fuels produced moderately lower CO emissions relative to diesel fuel. The B20 blend emitted less total hydrocarbon (THC) emissions compared with base diesel fuel. This was opposite to the fuel blends containing ethanol (BE15, BE20), which produced much higher THC emission.     

An experimental investigation on a DI diesel engine using waste plastic oil with exhaust gas recirculation

Environmental degradation and depleting oil reserves are matters of great concern around the globe. Developing countries like India depend heavily on oil import of about 125 Mt per annum (7:1 diesel/gasoline). Diesel being the main transport fuel in India, finding a suitable alternative to diesel is an urgent need. In this context, waste plastic solid is currently receiving renewed interest. Waste plastic oil is suitable for compression ignition engines and more attention is focused in India because of its potential to generate large-scale employment and relatively low environmental degradation. The present investigation was to study the effect of cooled exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) on four stroke, single cylinder, direct injection (DI) diesel engine using 100% waste plastic oil. Experimental results showed higher oxides of nitrogen emissions when fueled with waste plastic oil without EGR. NO_x emissions were reduced when the engine was operated with cooled EGR. The EGR level was optimized as 20% based on significant reduction in NO_x emissions, minimum possible smoke, CO, HC emissions and comparable brake thermal efficiency. Smoke emissions of waste plastic oil were higher at all loads. Combustion parameters were found to be comparable with and without EGR. Compression ignition engines run on waste plastic oil are found to emit higher oxides of nitrogen.     

Effect of dimethoxy-methane and exhaust gas recirculation on combustion and emission characteristics of a direct injection diesel engine

The effect of fuel constituents and exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) on combustion characteristics, fuel efficiency and emissions of a direct injection diesel engine fueled with diesel-dimethoxymethane (DMM) blends was investigated experimentally. Three diesel-DMM blended fuels containing 20%, 30% and 50% by volume fraction of DMM, corresponding to 8.5%, 12.7% and 21.1% by mass of oxygen in the blends, were used. By the use of DMM, it is observed that CO and smoke emissions as well as the total number and mass concentration of particulate reduce significantly, while HC emissions and particulate number with lower geometric mean diameters (D_i < 0.039 μm) increase slightly. For each fuel, there is an increase of ignition delay whereas a decrease of cylinder pressure and heat release rate in the premixed combustion phase when the diesel engine was operated with EGR system. The brake thermal efficiency fluctuates at small EGR ratio, while decreases with the further increase of EGR ratio. With an increase of EGR ratio, NO_x emission is reduced at the cost of increased smoke, HC and CO emissions as well as the total number and mass of particulates for each fuel.     

Effects of ethyl tert-butyl ether addition to diesel fuel on characteristics of combustion and exhaust emissions of diesel engines

The effects of ethyl tert-butyl ether (ETBE) addition to diesel fuel on the characteristics of combustion and exhaust emissions of a common rail direct injection diesel engine with high rates of cooled exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) were investigated. Test fuels were prepared by blending 0, 10, 20, 30 and 40 vol% ETBE to a commercial diesel fuel. Increasing ETBE fraction in the fuel helps to suppress the smoke emission increasing with EGR, but a too high fraction of ETBE leads to misfiring at higher EGR rates. While the combustion noise and NO_x emissions increase with increases in ETBE fraction at relatively low EGR rates, they can be suppressed to low levels by increasing EGR. Though there are no significant increases in THC and CO emissions due to ETBE addition to diesel fuel in a wide range of EGR rates, the ETBE blended fuel results in higher aldehyde emissions than the pure diesel fuel at relatively low EGR rates. With the 30% ETBE blended fuel, the operating load range of smokeless, ultra-low NO_x (<0.5 g/kWi h), and efficient diesel combustion with high rates of cooled EGR is extended to higher loads than with the pure diesel fuel.     

Experimental investigation on the combustion and exhaust emission characteristics of biogas-biodiesel dual-fuel combustion in a CI engine

An experimental investigation was performed to study the influence of dual-fuel combustion characteristics on the exhaust emissions and combustion performance in a diesel engine fueled with biogas-biodiesel dual-fuel. In this work, the combustion pressure and the rate of heat release were evaluated under various conditions in order to analyze the combustion and emission characteristics for single-fuel (diesel and biodiesel) and dual-fuel (biogas-diesel and biogas-biodiesel) combustion modes in a diesel engine. In addition, to compare the engine performances and exhaust emission characteristics with combustion mode, fuel consumption, exhaust gas temperature, efficiency, and exhaust emissions were also investigated under various test conditions. For the dual-fuel system, the intake system of the test engine was modified to convert into biogas and biodiesel of a dual-fueled combustion engine. Biogas was injected during the intake process by two electronically controlled gas injectors, which were installed in the intake pipe.The results of this study showed that the combustion characteristics of single-fuel combustion for biodiesel and diesel indicated the similar patterns at various engine loads. In dual-fuel mode, the peak pressure and heat release for biogas-biodiesel were slightly lower compared to biogas-diesel at low load. At 60% load, biogas-biodiesel combustion exhibited the slightly higher peak pressure, rate of heat release (ROHR) and indicated mean effective pressure (IMEP) than those of diesel. Also, the ignition delay for biogas-biodiesel indicated shortened trends compared to ULSD dual-fueling due to the higher cetane number (CN) of biodiesel. Significantly lower NO_x emissions were emitted under dual-fuel operation for both cases of pilot fuels compared to single-fuel mode at all engine load conditions. Also, biogas-biodiesel provided superior performance in reductions of soot emissions due to the absence of aromatics, the low sulfur, and oxygen contents for biodiesel.     

Effect of EGR and injection timing on combustion and emission characteristics of split injection strategy DI-diesel engine fueled with biodiesel

In this study, the effect of injection timing and EGR rate on the combustion and emissions of a Ford Lion V6 split injection strategy direct injection diesel engine has been experimentally investigated by using neat biodiesel produced from soybean oil. The results showed that, with the increasing of EGR rate, the brake specific fuel combustion (BSFC) and soot emission were slightly increased, and nitrogen oxide (NO_x) emission was evidently decreased. Under higher EGR rate, the peak pressure was slightly lower, and the peak heat release rate kept almost identical at lower engine load, and was higher at higher engine load. With the main injection timing retarded, BSFC was slightly increased, NO_x emission was evidently decreased, and soot emission hardly varied. The second peak pressure was evidently decreased and the heat release rate was slightly increased.     

Combustion and emissions of a DI diesel engine fuelled with diesel-oxygenate blends

Combustion and emissions of a DI diesel engine fuelled with diesel-oxygenate blends were investigated. The results show that there exist the different behaviors in the combustion between the diesel-diglyme blends and the other five diesel-oxygenate blends as the diglyme has the higher cetane number than that of diesel fuel while the other five oxygenates have the lower cetane number than that of diesel fuel. The smoke concentration decreases regardless of the types of oxygenate additives, and the smoke decreases with the increase of the oxygen mass fraction in the blends without increasing the NO_x and engine thermal efficiency. The reduction of smoke is strongly related to the oxygen-content of blends. CO and HC concentrations decrease with the increase of oxygen mass fraction in the blends. Unlike conventional diesel engines fueled with pure diesel fuel, engine operating on the diesel-oxygenate blends presents a flat NO_x/Smoke tradeoff curve versus oxygen mass fraction.     

Biodiesel development from high acid value polanga seed oil and performance evaluation in a CI engine

Non-edible filtered high viscous (72 cSt at 40 °C) and high acid value (44 mg KOH/gm) polanga (Calophyllum inophyllum L.) oil based mono esters (biodiesel) produced by triple stage transesterification process and blended with high speed diesel (HSD) were tested for their use as a substitute fuel of diesel in a single cylinder diesel engine. HSD and polanga oil methyl ester (POME) fuel blends (20%, 40%, 60%, 80%, and 100%) were used for conducting the short-term engine performance tests at varying loads (0%, 20%, 40%, 60%, 80%, and 100%). Tests were carried out over entire range of engine operation at varying conditions of speed and load. The brake specific fuel consumption (BSFC) and brake thermal efficiency (BTE) were calculated from the recorded data. The engine performance parameters such as fuel consumption, thermal efficiency, exhaust gas temperature and exhaust emissions (CO, CO₂, HC, NO_x, and O₂) were recorded. The optimum engine operating condition based on lower brake specific fuel consumption and higher brake thermal efficiency was observed at 100% load for neat biodiesel. From emission point of view the neat POME was found to be the best fuel as it showed lesser exhaust emission as compared to HSD.     

An experimental study for the effects of boost pressure on the performance and exhaust emissions of a DI-HCCI gasoline engine

As an alternative combustion mode, the HCCI combustion has some benefits compared to conventional SI and CI engines, such as low NO_x emission and high thermal efficiency. However, this combustion mode can produce higher UHC and CO emissions than those of conventional engines. In the naturally aspirated HCCI engines, the low engine output power limits its use in the current engine technologies. Intake air pressure boosting is a common way to improve the engine output power which is widely used in high performance SI and CI engine applications. Therefore, in this study, the effect of inlet air pressure on the performance and exhaust emissions of a DI-HCCI gasoline engine has been investigated after converting a heavy-duty diesel engine to a HCCI direct-injection gasoline engine. The experiments were performed at three different inlet air pressures while operating the engine at the same equivalence ratio and intake air temperature as in normally aspirated HCCI engine condition at different engine speeds. The SOI timing was set dependently to achieve the maximum engine torque at each test condition. The effects of inlet air pressure both on the emissions such as CO, UHC and NO_x and on the performance parameters such as BSFC, torque, thermal and combustion efficiencies have been discussed. The relationships between the emissions are also provided.     

Study of oxygenated biomass fuel blends on a diesel engine

Vegetable methyl ester was added in ethanol–diesel fuel to prevent separation of ethanol from diesel in this study. The ethanol blend proportion can be increased to 30% in volume by adding the vegetable methyl ester. Engine performance and emissions characteristics of the fuel blends were investigated on a diesel engine and compared with those of diesel fuel. Experimental results show that the torque of the engine is decreased by 6%–7% for every 10% (by volume) ethanol added to the diesel fuel without modification on the engine. Brake specific fuel consumption (BSFC) increases with the addition of oxygen from ethanol but equivalent brake specific fuel consumption (EBSFC) of oxygenated fuels is at the same level of that of diesel. Smoke and particulate matter (PM) emissions decrease significantly with the increase of oxygen content in the fuel. However, PM reduction is less significant than smoke reduction. In addition, PM components are affected by the oxygenated fuel. When blended fuels are used, nitrogen oxides (NO_x) emissions are almost the same as or slightly higher than the NO_x emissions when diesel fuel is used. Hydrocarbon (HC) is apparently decreased when the engine was fueled with ethanol–ester–diesel blends. Fuelling the engine with oxygenated diesel fuels showed increased carbon monoxide (CO) emissions at low and medium loads, but reduced CO emissions at high and full loads, when compared to pure diesel fuel.     

Effects of biodiesel on a DI diesel engine performance, emission and combustion characteristics

Experimental tests were investigated to evaluate the performance, emission and combustion of a diesel engine using neat rapeseed oil and its blends of 5%, 20% and 70%, and standard diesel fuel separately. The results indicate that the use of biodiesel produces lower smoke opacity (up to 60%), and higher brake specific fuel consumption (BSFC) (up to 11%) compared to diesel fuel. The measured CO emissions of B5 and B100 fuels were found to be 9% and 32% lower than that of the diesel fuel, respectively. The BSFC of biodiesel at the maximum torque and rated power conditions were found to be 8.5% and 8% higher than that of the diesel fuel, respectively. From the combustion analysis, it was found that ignition delay was shorter for neat rapeseed oil and its blends tested compared to that of standard diesel. The combustion characteristics of rapeseed oil and its diesel blends closely followed those of standard diesel.     

The influence of operating parameters on the performance and emissions of a DI diesel engine using methanol-blended-diesel fuel

In this study, the effects of injection pressure and timing on the performance and emission characteristics of a DI diesel engine using methanol (5%, 10% and 15%) blended-diesel fuel were investigated. The tests were conducted on three different injection pressures (180, 200 and 220 bar) and timings (15°, 20°, and 25° CA BTDC) at 20 Nm engine load and 2200 rpm. The results indicated that brake specific fuel consumption (BSFC), brake specific energy consumption (BSEC), and nitrogen oxides (NO_x) emissions increased as brake thermal efficiency (BTE), smoke opacity, carbon monoxide (CO) and total unburned hydrocarbon (THC) decreased with increasing amount of methanol in the fuel mixture. The best results were achieved for BSFC, BSEC and BTE at the original injection pressure and timing. For the all test fuels, the increasing injection pressure and timing caused to decrease in the smoke opacity, CO, THC emissions while NO_x emissions increase.     

Performance of compression ignition engine with mahua (Madhuca indica) biodiesel

The performance of biodiesel obtained from mahua oil and its blend with high speed diesel in a Ricardo E6 engine has been presented in this paper together with some of its fuel properties. These properties were found to be comparable to diesel and confirming to both the American and European standards. Engine performance (brake specific fuel consumption, brake thermal efficiency and exhaust gas temperature) and emissions (CO, smoke density and NO_x) were measured to evaluate and compute the behaviour of the diesel engine running on biodiesel. The reductions in exhaust emissions and brake specific fuel consumption together with increase brake power, brake thermal efficiency made the blend of biodiesel (B20) a suitable alternative fuel for diesel and thus could help in controlling air pollution.     

Experimental investigation of diesel engine performance and emission characteristics using jojoba/diesel blend and sunflower oil

Experimental study has been carried out to investigate performance parameters, emissions, cylinder pressure, exhaust gas temperature (T_exhaust) and engine wall temperatures (T_wall) for direct injection diesel engine. Tests were conducted for sunflower oil (S100) and 20% jojoba oil + 80% pure diesel fuel (B20) in comparison to pure diesel fuel with different engine speeds. S100 and B20 were selected for the study because of its being widely used in Egypt and in the world. Also, series of tests are conducted at same previous conditions with different percentage of exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) from 0% to 12% of inlet mass of air fresh charge. Results indicate that S100 or B20 gives lower brake thermal efficiency (η_B), brake power (BP), brake mean effective pressure (BMEP), and higher brake specific fuel consumption (BSFC) due to lower heating value compared to pure diesel fuel. S100 or B20 gives lower NO_X concentration due to lower gas temperature. S100 or B20 gives higher T_wall and T_exhaust due to incomplete combustion inside engine cylinder. S100 or B20 gives higher CO and CO₂ concentrations due to higher carbon/hydrogen ratio. The position of maximum pressure (P_max) change for pure diesel fuel is earlier than for S100 or B20. The results show that S100 or B20 are promising as alternative fuel for diesel engine. The utilization of vegetable oils does not require a significant modification of existing engines. This can be seen as the main advantage of vegetable oils. The main disadvantages of biodiesel fuels are high viscosity, drying with time, thickening in cold conditions, flow and atomization characteristics.     

Combustion and emissions characteristics of compression-ignition engine using dual ammonia-diesel fuel

This study investigated the combustion and emissions characteristics of a compression-ignition engine using a dual-fuel approach with ammonia and diesel fuel. Ammonia can be regarded as a hydrogen carrier and used as a fuel, and its combustion does not produce carbon dioxide. In this study, ammonia vapor was introduced into the intake manifold and diesel fuel was injected into the cylinder to initiate combustion. The test engine was a four-cylinder, turbocharged diesel engine with slight modifications to the intake manifold for ammonia induction. An ammonia fueling system was developed, and various combinations of ammonia and diesel fuel were successfully tested. One scheme was to use different combinations of ammonia and diesel fuel to achieve a constant engine power. The other was to use a small quantity of diesel fuel and vary the amount of ammonia to achieve variable engine power. Under the constant engine power operation, in order to achieve favorable fuel efficiency, the preferred operation range was to use 40-60% energy provided by diesel fuel in conjunction with 60-40% energy supplied by ammonia. Exhaust carbon monoxide and hydrocarbon emissions using the dual-fuel approach were generally higher than those of using pure diesel fuel to achieve the same power output, while NO_x emissions varied with different fueling combinations. NO_x emissions could be reduced if ammonia accounted for less than 40% of the total fuel energy due to the lower combustion temperature resulting in lower thermal NO_x. If ammonia accounted for the majority of the fuel energy, NO_x emissions increased significantly due to the fuel-bound nitrogen. On the other hand, soot emissions could be reduced significantly if a significant amount of ammonia was used due to the lack of carbon present in the combination of fuels. Despite the overall high ammonia conversion efficiency (nearly 100%), exhaust ammonia emissions ranged from 1000 to 3000 ppmV and further after-treatment will be required due to health concerns. On the other hand, the variable engine power operation resulted in relatively poor fuel efficiency and high exhaust ammonia emissions due to the lack of diesel energy to initiate effective combustion of the lean ammonia-air mixture. The in-cylinder pressure history was also analyzed, and results indicated that ignition delay increased with increasing amounts of ammonia due to its high resistance to autoignition. The peak cylinder pressure also decreased because of the lower combustion temperature of ammonia. It is recommended that further combustion optimization using direct ammonia/diesel injection strategies be performed to increase the combustion efficiency and reduce exhaust ammonia emissions.     

Engine performance, exhaust emissions and combustion characteristics of a CI engine fuelled with croton megalocarpus methyl ester with antioxidant

The use of biodiesel as a substitute for petroleum-based diesel has become of great interest for the reasons of combating the destruction of the environment, the price of petroleum-based diesel and dependency on foreign energy sources. But for practical feasibility of biodiesel, antioxidants are added to increase the oxidation stability during long term storage. It is quite possible that these additives may affect the clean burning characteristics of biodiesel. This study investigated the experimental effects of antioxidants on the oxidation stability, engine performance, exhaust emissions and combustion characteristics of a four cylinder turbocharged direct injection (TDI) diesel engine fuelled with biodiesel from croton megalocarpus oil. The three synthetic antioxidants evaluated its effectiveness on oxidation stability of croton oil methyl ester (COME) were 1, 2, 3 tri-hydroxy benzene (Pyrogallol, PY), 3, 4, 5-tri hydroxy benzoic acid (Propyl Gallate, PG) and 2-tert butyl-4-methoxy phenol (Butylated Hydroxyanisole, BHA). The fuel sample tested in TDI diesel engine include pure croton biodiesel (B100), croton biodiesel dosed with 1000 ppm of an effective antioxidant (B100 + PY1000), B20 (20% croton biodiesel and 80% mineral diesel) and diesel fuel which was used as base fuel. The result showed that the effectiveness of the antioxidants was in the order of PY > PG > BHA. The brake specific fuel consumption (BSFC) of biodiesel fuel with antioxidants decreased more than that of biodiesel fuel without antioxidants, but both were higher than that of diesel. Antioxidants had few effects on the exhaust emissions of a diesel engine running on biodiesel. Combustion characteristics in diesel engine were not influenced by the addition of antioxidants in biodiesel fuel. This study recommends PY and PG to be used for safeguarding biodiesel fuel from the effects of autoxidation during storage. Overall, the biodiesel derived from croton megalocarpus oil can be utilized as partial substitute for mineral diesel.     

Performance of diesel engine with biodiesel at varying compression ratio and ignition timing

The performance of Ricardo E6 engine using biodiesel obtained from mahua oil (B100) and its blend with high speed diesel (HSD) at varying compression ratio (CR), injection timing (IT) and engine loading (L) has been presented in this paper. The brake specific fuel consumption (BSFC) and exhaust gas temperature (EGT) increased, whereas brake thermal efficiency (BTE) decreased with increase in the proportion of biodiesel in the blends at all compression ratios (18:1-20:1) and injection timings (35-45° before TDC) tested. However, a reverse trend for these parameters was observed with increase in the CR and advancement of IT. The BSFC of B100 and its blends with high speed diesel reduced, whereas BTE and EGT increased with the increase in L for the range of CR and IT tested. The differences of BTEs between HSD and B100 were also not statistically significant at engine settings of ‘CR20IT40’ and ‘CR20IT45’. Thus, even B100 could be used on the Ricardo engine at these settings without affecting the performance obtained using HSD.     

Experimental investigation of mineral diesel fuel, GTL fuel, RME and neat soybean and rapeseed oil combustion in a heavy duty on-road engine with exhaust gas aftertreatment

The effects of mineral diesel fuel, gas-to-liquid fuel, rapeseed methyl ester, neat soybean and neat rapeseed oil on injection, combustion, efficiency and pollutant emissions have been studied on a compression ignition heavy duty engine operated near full load and equipped with a combined exhaust gas aftertreatment system (oxidation catalyst, particle filter, selective catalytic NO_x reduction). In a first step, the engine calibration was kept constant for all fuels which led to differences in engine torque for the different fuels. In a second step, the injection duration was modified so that all fuels led to the same engine torque. In a third step, the engine was recalibrated in order to keep the NO_x emissions at an equal level for all fuels (injection pressure, injection timing, EGR rate). The experiments show that the critical NO_x emissions were higher (even behind the exhaust gas aftertreatment systems) for oxygenated fuels in case of the engine not being recalibrated for the fuel. GTL and the oxygenated fuels show lower emissions for some pollutants and higher efficiency after recalibration to equal NO_x levels.     

Characteristics of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons emissions of diesel engine fueled with biodiesel and diesel

With mutagenic and carcinogenic potential, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) from mobile source exhaust have contributed to a substantial share of air toxics. In order to characterize the PAHs emissions of diesel engine fueled with diesel, biodiesel (B100) and its blend (B20), an experimental study has been carried out on a direct-injection turbocharged diesel engine. The particle-phase and gas-phase PAHs in engine exhaust were collected by fiberglass filters and “PUF/XAD-2/PUF” cartridges, respectively, then the PAHs were determined by a gas chromatograph/mass spectrometer (GC/MS). The experimental results indicated that comparing with diesel, using B100 and B20 can greatly reduce the total PAHs emissions of diesel engine by 19.4% and 13.1%, respectively. The Benzo[a]Pyrene (BaP) equivalent of PAHs emissions were also decreased by 15.0% with the use of B100. For the three fuels, the gas-phase PAHs emissions were higher than particle-phase PAHs emissions and the most abundant PAH compounds from engine exhaust were naphthalene and phenanthrene. The analysis showed that there was a close correlation between total PAHs emissions and particulate matter (PM) emissions for three fuels. Furthermore, the correlation became more significant when using biodiesel.